Got Menubar Clutter On Your Mac? What You Need Is A Mac Bartender App

The past couple of years have seen a marked increase in the number of Mac utility apps.

They range from one-trick pony apps that do just one thing, to combo apps that you must have on your Mac. And, they’re inexpensive and everywhere.

Well, maybe not everywhere. It seems that every new Mac app that provides some utility that Apple doesn’t give us in Mac OS X is stuck in the Mac’s Menubar. There’s a problem with collecting so many Menubar apps.

The Menubar isn’t big enough to hold them all.

What You Want And Need Is A Bartender

If you’re like me an many other Mac users, you love those utility apps. The Mac’s Menubar makes an easy location for one-click implementation.

Nice, but the Menubar just isn’t big enough to keep all those apps within a click.

The Mac’s screen isn’t wide enough to support a couple of dozen Menubar apps and let the front most app display all its menus at the same time.

That’s where Bartender really shines. If necessity is the mother of invention, then something to fix the finite Menubar apps is needed, and Bartender is the invention.

Think of Bartender as a Menubar manager. First, it lets you display only those Menubar apps you want and need. Second, Bartender has its own menubar to display anything else you need.

The apps you want and need in the Mac’s Menubar will still be there, but you control which ones, and how many.

If you need more apps in the Menubar, Bartender gives you another menubar to use.

Even better, you have control over where the Bartender menubar is displayed.

As in the graphic above, you can display Bartender’s drop down menubar below the Bartender icon, or have it move to the left side of the Menubar where it can drop down below an app’s menu.

And, Bartender’s menubar can be set to display the maximum number of Mac Menubar apps. The app sets up in seconds. You’ll need a little time to sort out which Menubar app icons go where, but after it’s set, forget it. It just works.

The only negative is that Bartender is a beta app, but it’s free to try until the full first version is released.

5G? Meh!

About Jack Miller

I work for a US technology company in St. Louis, MO, and switched from Windows PCs to the Mac 25 years ago. My wife said it would improve our marriage, give us more friends, and reduce stress. I guess that two out of three isn't bad. Read more of my articles here.